The name of these two quiet workmen in the vineyard of reason was Sozzini.
They were uncle and nephew.
For some unknown reason, the older man, Lelio Francesco, spelled his name with one “z” and the younger, Fausto Paolo, spelled his with two “zs.” But as they are both of them much better known by the Latinized form of their name, Socinius, than by the Italian Sozzini, we can leave that detail to the grammarians and etymologists.
As far as their influence was concerned, the uncle was much less important than the nephew. We shall, therefore, deal with him first and speak of the nephew afterwards.
Lelio Sozini was a Siennese, the descendant of a race of bankers and judges and himself destined for a career at the bar, via the University of Bologna. But like so many of his contemporaries, he allowed himself to slip into theology, stopped reading law, played with Greek and Hebrew and Arabic and ended (as so often happens with people of his type) as a rationalistic mystic—a man who was at once very much of this world and yet never quite of it. This sounds complicated. But those who understand what I mean will understand without any further explanation, and the others would not understand, no matter what I said.
His father, however, seems to have had a suspicion that the son might amount to something in the world of letters. He gave his boy a check and bade him go forth and see whatever there was to be seen. And so Lelio left Sienna and during the next ten years, he traveled from Venice to Geneva and from Geneva to Zürich and from Zürich to Wittenberg and then to London and then to Prague and then to Vienna and then to Cracow, spending a few months or years in every town and hamlet where he hoped to find interesting company and might be able to learn something new and interesting. It was an age when people talked religion just as incessantly as today they talk business. Lelio must have collected a strange assortment of ideas and by keeping his ears open he was soon familiar with every heresy between the Mediterranean and the Baltic.
When, however, he carried himself and his intellectual luggage to Geneva, he was received politely but none too cordially. The pale eyes of Calvin looked upon this Italian visitor with grave suspicion. He was a distinguished young man of excellent family and not a poor, friendless wanderer like Servetus. It was said, however, that he had Servetian inclinations. And that was most disturbing. The case for or against the Trinity, so Calvin thought, had been definitely settled when the Spanish heretic was burned. On the contrary! The fate of Servetus had become a subject of conversation from Madrid to Stockholm, and serious-minded people all over the world were beginning to take the side of the anti-trinitarian. But that was not all. They were using Gutenberg’s devilish invention to spread their views broadcast and being at a safe distance from Geneva they were often far from complimentary in their remarks.
Only a short while before a very learned tract had appeared which contained everything the fathers of the Church had ever said or written upon the subject of persecuting and punishing heretics. It had an instantaneous and enormous sale among those who “hated God,” as Calvin said, or who “hated Calvin,” as they themselves protested. Calvin had let it be known that he would like to have a personal interview with the author of this precious booklet. But the author, anticipating such a request, had wisely omitted his name from the title-page.
It was said that he was called Sebastian Castellio, that he had been a teacher in one of the Geneva high schools and that his moderate views upon diverse theological enormities had gained him the hatred of Calvin and the approbation of Montaigne. No one, however, could prove this. It was mere hearsay. But where one had gone before, others might follow.
Calvin, therefore, was distantly polite to Sozzini, but suggested that the mild air of Basel would suit his Siennese friend much better than the damp climate of Savoy and heartily bade him Godspeed when he started on his way to the famous old Erasmian stronghold.